Someone had tapped into my Yahoo account. They had sent an email titled ‘hot news’ to every single person I have ever corresponded with. All my personal and professional contacts had been reached.

I had thought it would be apparent that this email was not from me, but from the responses I received, I was wrong.

One in particular stood out.

“Slovie, I am so happy to hear from you!! You spoke at our international woman’s conference last year and I cannot wait to see what you think is hot news! I ordered the raspberry drink immediately please do keep in touch!”

After consulting with my computer whiz, we determined that it was only my email account and not my computer that got affected. By the end of the morning, I was happy to be virus free.

Friday morning, I realized that I had stopped receiving emails. The hacker had tried to break into my email again and Yahoo froze my account. I had to change all vital passwords once again.

Just getting exasperated accomplishes nothing. There’s a purpose in everything that happens, even the troublesome ones. So what wisdom can we gain from the experience?

Source of Aggravation

I lost a lot of precious hours, time with my family, and experienced loads of aggravation. I also felt embarrassed that people who trust me would think that I would send out an email, subject matter ‘hot stuff,’ pushing some commercial item. Even my bank rep said he got my email. One couple whom I teach said, “We were kind of puzzled. This is so not your style.”

Do we realize how much aggravation we cause others?

The hacker seems to thrive on causing aggravation, something we know is wrong. But I wonder if we realize how much aggravation we do cause others, often unknowingly, or the effect of our words and actions. If we did, would we still act and speak the same way?

I think of the person who, without thinking, blasts his employee with personal insults and stinging criticism. The sharp words play over and over in the head of this man or woman who then returns home moody and feeling combative. Instead of a warm hello, the family is given an angry lecture. The kids end up fighting with each other; no one feels happy. Dinnertime is ruined-again. Unfortunately this has been happening in this family too often.

Do we begin to imagine the effect we have on the lives of others?

Do we realize that our actions cause tensions and ripple effects beyond the moment?

Let’s think about the popular child who had loads of friends and a great personality. She sends out a clever text, making fun of a classmate who is not part of the ‘in’ group. She never really sees the effects of her actions. Especially in cyberspace, we are clueless and never confront the vast pain we have caused.

She never gets to see that it is not just this classmate whom she hurt. Parents also suffer when their child experiences pain. They watch as self-confidence is stripped away. They don’t know what to do when they hear their child crying into her pillow at night; refusing to come out of her room.

We underestimate the power we have to cause others pain. The converse it also true; we have within us an incredible ability ability to bring joy to so many in this world.

Most people need to contemplate one great lesson: How can I view the world through a more compassionate lens? How can I learn to treat others with greater sensitivity?

There is a mitzvah in the Torah that spells it out for us simply. “Veahavta lerayacha kamocha” – love others as you love yourself. Rabbi Akiva tells us that this is an awesome principle for life. If we would just take a moment and think: how would I feel if someone did this to me? What will be the effects of my actions and words?

Mindfulness isn’t just about you; it’s about becoming aware of other people’s needs.

Today many people pursue the study of ‘mindfulness’ – how to live life with greater self-awareness. But this awareness cannot end by simply learning to be in touch with one’s own feelings. The Torah is teaching us to also become aware of the feelings that we create in others. Just as we seek inner peace, we must recognize that we can be a messenger of this same peace to those with whom we live.

The hacker also got me thinking about the God-given talents we have been given to use in this world. The person who is great at technology can use his gift to hurt others or to build. The same week that I was hacked, I met someone who was struggling in a new business. She told me that a friend set up a web page for her, and finally, she had hope as orders began to pour in.

This is a challenge we all face. Whether it is being great at technology, a savvy business sense, creative mind, or having a vivacious personality, are we utilizing our gifts to build or destroy?

I can thank the hacker for these lessons learned. I hope that he will somehow wake up and use his time and ability to accomplish good.

About the Author

Slovie Jungreis Wolff is a noted teacher, author, relationships and parenting lecturer. She is the leader of Hineni Couples and daughter of Rebbetzen Esther Jungreis. Slovie is the author of the parenting handbook, Raising A Child With Soul. She gives weekly classes and has lectured throughout the U.S.,Canada, Mexico, Panama, and South Africa. You can reach slovie at sloviehineni@gmail.com

The opinions expressed in the comment section are the personal views of the commenters. Comments are moderated, so please keep it civil.

Visitor Comments: 4

(4)
Anonymous,
April 11, 2013 8:31 PM

Real time protection

It's very important to keep your virus and malware definitons up to date and to be sure you surf safely. (If you don't know how to prevent malware from executing on a webpage ask a nerd - every family has at least one.

Brute force hacking almost never happens and since you had a virus this wasn't a case of it. That being said the two least secure providers of free mail are hotmail and yahoo which periodically have vulnerabilities. If you use such services do your friends a favour and don't use them from the web. Gmail by contrast is very secure and offers the most recovery mechanism. You can set it up to come to your email client very easily.

I do game support and 100 people a day at least are hacked but nearly always because they went to a website with unsafe content. Good security softtware will prescan the sites. Often mailicious ones masquerade as normal ones being only slightly different so pay attention.

Because every compromise has the potential to harm your family and friends and business aquaintences I think applying a little mindfulness to computer security is a good use of your resources. These things tend to snowball. While the people who do this misapply the talents that Hashem gave them protecting yourself from them isn't difficult Since your hacker was successful and there is money in it he will not be having a crissis of conscience. Only repeated failure usually causes them to seek new work.

(3)
Zipora,
April 10, 2013 5:48 PM

This is a good lesson for us to to be kind to one another thank you again for inspiring us all to be better and kind people to our friends and family

(2)
Rabbi Finkel of Chicago,
April 10, 2013 12:23 AM

Appropriate Message for Yom HaShoah

Sadder yet....are people who destroy the lives of innocent people, yet are honored by their enablers in the community as upstanding role models or community leaders. Instead of utilizing their G-d given gifts for good, they use them for shenanigans and underhanded tricks. Instead of acquiring a Crown of Good Name through their good deeds, they seek to acquire such a reputation by buying honor. The community is unfortunately not astute enough to understand who the innocent victims vs. the fakers are. Just because someone by the grace of G-d survived the Holocaust, is in no way an endorsement by G-d to raise their own children to be arrogant criminals, while they project an innocent veneer of sweet Holocaust survivors. Such people disgrace the name and memories of the majority of upstanding families who suffered through the Holocaust yet live/d exemplary lives and give/gave their descendants a legacy of living with care, concern, and compassion for others who experience pain.

(1)
Anonymous,
April 4, 2013 8:38 PM

some people are amelek :(

Some people do not know the aggravation they are causing but some do. And they just don't care about anything but themselves. While some may grow out of it, repent and make teshuva, some people are psychopaths - with no conscience (or only a blunted one) and all they care about is the material world and their own overbloated self. I ask myself almost every day why Hashem would have created these terrible broken souls with no conscience and faulty brains - but only Hashem knows. Since he made them with no conscience and improper brain wiring from recent research they cannot possiibly ever repent. teshuva is impossible for them. they make most of the darkest evil that plagues the world. Now that hacking has become profitable they make bots to hack into people account to sell useless things like raspberry ketone drink. I This is the least of the dark garbage they perpetrate and which Hashem allows them to do. We need to pray that there is a cure for this brain soul sickness wish and pray that Hashem would mercifully either fix these people so they could repent and stop mucking up the wonderful world for those of us who have a conscience and are therefore redeemable.

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I always loved the story of Jonah and the whale. Why do we read it during the afternoon service of Yom Kippur?

The Aish Rabbi Replies:

Let's recap the story: God tells Jonah to go to Ninveh and to prophesy that in 40 days, God will destroy the city. Instead, Jonah goes to Jaffa, boards a ship, and sails for Tarshish. A great storm arises. Frightened, Jonah goes to sleep in the ship's hold. The sailors somehow recognize that Jonah is responsible for the storm. They throw him overboard, and the sea becomes calm.

A great fish swallows Jonah. Then three days later, God commands the fish to spit Jonah back out upon dry land. God tells Jonah, "Let's try it again. Go to Ninveh and tell them in 40 days I will destroy the city."

The story is a metaphor for our struggle for clarity. Jonah is the soul. The soul is assigned to sanctify the world, and draw it close to God. But we are seduced by the world's beauty. (Jaffa in Hebrew means "beauty.") The ship is the body, the sea is the world, and the storm is life's pains and troubles. God hopes confrontation with mortality will inspire us to examine our lives. But Jonah's is the more common response - we go to sleep (have a beer, turn on the television). The sailors throw Jonah overboard - this is death. The fish that swallows Jonah is the grave. Jonah is spat back upon the land - reincarnation. And the Almighty tells us to try again. "Go sanctify the world and bring it close to God."

Each of us is born with an opportunity and a challenge. We each have unique gifts to offer the world and unique challenges to perfect ourselves. If we leave the task unfinished the first time, we get a second chance. Jonah teaches us that repentance can reverse a harsh decree. If the residents of Ninveh had the ability to correct their mistakes and do teshuva, how much more so do we have the ability to correct our former mistakes and do teshuva.

(source: "The Bible for the Clueless But Curious," by Rabbi Nachum Braverman)

In 1948, Egypt launched a large-scale offensive against the Negev region of Israel. This was part of the War of Independence, an attack by five Arab armies designed to "drive the Jews into the sea." Though the Jews were under-armed, untrained, and few in number, through ingenuity and perseverance they staved off the attacks and secured the borders. Yet the price was high -- Israel lost 6,373 of its people, a full one percent of the Jewish population of Israel at the time.

And what does teshuvah consist of? [Repentance to the degree] that the One Who knows all that is hidden will testify that he will never again repeat this sin(Maimonides, Laws of Teshuvah 2:2).

"How can this be?" ask the commentaries. "Inasmuch as man always has free choice to do good or evil, to sin or not to sin, how can God testify that a person will never repeat a particular sin? Is this not a repudiation of one's free will?"

The answer to this came to me at a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, at which the speaker, a man who had been sober for twenty-one years, said, "The man I was drank. The man I was will drink again. But now I am a different man."

A sin does not occur in a vacuum. A person who is devout does not abruptly decide to eat treifah. A sin occurs when a person is in such a state that a particular act is not anathema to him.

Consequently, repentance is not complete if one merely regrets having done wrong. One must ask, "How did this sin ever come about? In what kind of a state was I that permitted me to commit this sin?"

True repentance thus consists of changing one's character to the point where, as the person is now, one can no longer even consider doing the forbidden act. Of course, the person's character may deteriorate - and if it does, he may sin again.

God does not testify that the person will never repeat the sin, but rather that his degree of repentance and correction of his character defects are such that, as long as he maintains his new status, he will not commit that sin.

Today I shall...

try to understand how I came to do those things that I regret having done, and bring myself to a state where such acts will be alien to me.

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